Interview – Vinyl Williams: Journey Through Sonic Dimensions
Few artists blur the lines between sound and vision as fearlessly as Vinyl Williams. The celestial psych-pop explorer returns with a new double LP, Polyhaven / Portasymphony, a boundary-pushing fusion of lo-fi and hi-fi aesthetics that offers a deep dive into analog textures, metaphysical architecture, and the beauty of imperfection. In this exclusive AudioFuzz interview, Vinyl Williams opens up about the philosophies guiding his sonic experiments, his love for amateur production, and the cosmic underpinnings of his Musical Astrology project. With references ranging from Van Dyke Parks to Cindy Lee, and an eye for both tape hiss and digital interactivity, this conversation offers a portal into the vast, genreless world he’s crafted—one where intuition reigns, imperfections shine, and sound becomes structure. Welcome to the ever-expanding universe of Vinyl Williams.
1. Your upcoming double LP, Polyhaven / Portasymphony, explores both lo-fi and hi-fi soundscapes within the same release. What inspired you to present these two sonic worlds together, and how do they interact or contrast with each other within the album?
There’s nothing I love more than an amateur recording. Fellow active artists like quickly, quickly, UMO, Peel Dream Magazine, Draag, even Knower & the Louis Cole crew, continue to blow my mind with their self-production capabilities. I of course look back to Van Dyke Parks as well putting a cigarette butt in between the tension arm and the tape while recording his harps on The All-Golden, and it’s been hard to refuse the influence of all the lo-fi pioneers, however controversial as they may be. (Except for Todd Rundgren, maybe)
Both albums employ a set of restrictions. With Polyhaven, I tried not to add too many tracks – just what’s fundamentally necessary. I also experimented recording entire songs multitracked on a reel to reel for the first time, mixed completely analog with a stereo output. They turned out pretty damn hi-fi actually, with a tastefully gritty texture. Portasymphony was recorded completely on a Tascam 488 Portastudio, with 8 recordable tracks to work with. (I believe only 7 of them function?) This is also the first time I’ve made entire recordings all on a portable cassette machine, and I’ve been compiling them since the end of 2023 after I released Aeterna, the last album. I accumulated over 20 portastudio recordings and narrowed them down to 17, though only 15 fit on the vinyl LP. (which ended up being over 25 minutes a side – pushing it to the absolute limit!) The hi-fi and lo-fi albums were both chances for me to use less, and to also record takes all the way through without stopping, to try to authentically amplify the energy I’m hearing in the potential of each song.
I did make the discovery that by simply unscrewing a cassette’s faceplate and moving the tape off of one of the rotating tape guides, you can create a ridiculously warbly tape. I used the same one for the entire Portasymphony album, which became recorded over multiple times – though still a few original multitrack recordings exist on there!
2. Your visual and musical work often taps into expansive, celestial, and even metaphysical themes—described as a ‘celestial city in the sky.’ Do you see your music and 3D interactive worlds as separate entities, or are they all part of the same interconnected universe in your mind?
I can definitely hear sounds as three-dimensional architecture. The low frequencies act as a site’s foundation, and the melodic elements create the vertical space. When creating videos, I’m still an amateur artist and not super technical, so making it musical is always a fun challenge. Running video through analog circuitry and back to digital is a good way of making it actually vibrate and shimmer. One of my biggest current artistic influences is Javier Senosiain, pioneering organic architect from Mexico. His famous sites such as Satellite Set, and the Nautilus House, are ultimate examples of the possibilities of our collective ambition and imagination. I actively try to create the organic architecture of my wildest dreams in the 3D realm, as well as through mixed media & paper collage. I suppose this applies to music as well, though it’s more of a feeling-based process rather than a deliberate one. Writing & recording may become deliberate, but its conception is always intuitive. It might actually be the same as the visual worlds, as their essence is contained in the initial irrational conception and their creation becomes more of a deliberate problem-solving process. Though I practice active imagination when recording a new song, the best ideas come to me rather than being fished for. Something just starts looping in my mind until I have to put it down. I’m not thinking visually when writing or recording each layer, but their visual qualities become unveiled automatically as the recording process progresses.
3. Your latest single, “Find the Hidden,” is accompanied by an interactive video (which we LOVE) where viewers can actively search for hidden objects. What was the creative process behind building this experience, and how do you see interactivity shaping the way people engage with music in the future?
Oh man, this was a fun one to figure out. I’ve always wanted to create an interactive treasure hunt that give you points for finding each object. I’ve been researching how to do it for a while, and was held up at many standstills in trying to build my own code-based-interface on top of a video, since I’m so incredibly bad at coding. I found a program called 3DVista, which is usually used for interactive architectural walkthroughs, E-Learning, among other things. You’re actually able to add animated clickable hotspots on top of any video, even if it’s not 360 degrees or interactive. It can make any static video interactive! You can assign any action to the hotspots you want, even multiple-choice questions, which you can get grades on at the end, and videos within the video that pop-up. The possibilities are absolutely endless.
The song is about our need to be free from the confines of everyday Western life, namely working just to get by. I tried to curve, or at least delay my incessant inclinations to create multi-religious space palaces to attempt to communicate this very real issue, in a lighthearted pun-like way. One main symbolic gesture in the video is the scene where you’re floating down a river of money with Wells Fargo & Bank of America on the banks of the river. Initially they were burning, but it refused to render the fire – only on the banks, not on the torches or other objects. Too dark I guess.
I think interactive experiences don’t need to abide by the rigorous limitations of published games. There’s a freedom built-in to interactivity both within the process of creation as well as through the act of experience. There’s a lot of intentionality that can be used in interactive works & games, particularly with the users emotions. So many games, if not most of all of them, include fear, or some form of stress as part of the game. Yes, these are qualities of life that we can all train towards being better at navigating, but sometimes we want to just turn off from all of that stress, fear, and conflict, and go into something beautiful, open, and hopefully emotionally revitalizing, and of course ultimately inspiring for others (you) to do the same.
4. You’ve drawn inspiration from a wide range of artists, from Iasos to Cindy Lee and Van Dyke Parks. How do these influences shape your own sonic world, and are there any specific techniques or philosophies from them that have found their way into Polyhaven / Portasymphony?
After meeting Iasos in 2013 at a Greek Cafe in Sausilito, CA, I was convinced he was really in touch with something beyond. We both shared an experience where we witnessed hundreds of palaces beamed into our mind in a millisecond. His music was also used as an example for patients who had near-death experiences, among many other types of music it ranked the highest by far in representing the sonic space between life and death. It happened to be that his song was the only one of the lot that actually had the intention of representing this space, and it seemed as though it was clearly, somewhat-universally communicated. I entrust in him with ushering in a new era of harmonious music possibilities. He’ll always work his way into my sonic thought process and imagination, envisioning giant angelic chords shifting and modulating in extreme ways. Pat Flagel from Cindy Lee is kind of like the West’s ultimate current guitar hero, shredding the most ridiculous sound, like some kind of haunted western Canadian nihilism. Just like ancient Syrian furniture from Damascus, there’s always at least one deliberate flaw, as nothing can be as perfect as God. Pat really hones in on this fact and embraces the fuck ups, which we all appreciate. Their commitment to the bright luminance of beautiful failure is unmatched.
5. Your Musical Astrology project is a fascinating fusion of cosmic forces and sound. What first led you to explore the connection between astrology and music, and how do you think this system of understanding relationships through sound changes the way we perceive ourselves and others?
I had an epiphany on Valentine’s Day 2021, using the 12 notes in the Western octave and the 12 months in our Gregorian calendar year to relate the space between our birthdays to the space between musical notes, called intervals. I thought it was just an idea at first, though my body was filled with goosebumps of light, I had to test it out immediately, so I went to Stories Cafe in Echo Park, which happened to be one of the first days they re-opened their back patio since Covid. This was good because there were people hanging out there which I could interview. I went up to the first couple I saw and asked them their birthdays. She said she was born around July 15th, and her partner was born around June 12th. This relationship, being one month away, is what gave me the idea, because it’s the “Jaws Theme” when the lower month is the root note, and the “God Chord” (as I call it) when the higher month is the root note. So, I said, “You ma’am are the leader of this relationship. You call all the shots, are the more rational one, and are this man’s sugar mama. You sir, follow her lead, ride off of her, and are the more creative, irrational one.” She then proclaimed “Yep, I own this cafe, and he lives for free upstairs.” He then chimed in, “Yep, I live rent-free upstairs.” – This was my first bit of corroborating evidence that the music of our birthdays can actually tell a lot about our relationships, particularly the rational and irrational roles we play with one another. Some relationships are more even on either side, while others, like being 1 month apart, are a bit defined/fixed in terms of these roles. To sum it up, the laws of frequency resonance can apply to the space between anything, especially birthdays of any living things, all of the possibilities of which have inherent emotional & geometric qualities to them. Such as in an oscilloscope, when seeing the visualization of the “Jaws Theme”, its geometry is ultra discordant and asymmetrical, but switching the chord the other way – to a Major 7th, or the “God Chord” creates a beautiful symmetrical toroidal pattern that looks like a donut. These are the inherent qualities of these intervals, which are fixed and unchanging. They provide an emotional blueprint for our relationships, where certain qualities may be more thematically prevalent than others.
For me, Musical Astrology has assisted me so much with guiding my emotions, and to prepare for certain challenges before they arise. For example, if somebody’s born a month after me, and I’m going to be in any kind of rational position for them, I better plan extremely accordingly and exercise gracefulness throughout the process! If you can expect certain triggers in advance, it can help provide a causal explanation for them, reducing behavioral impulses, and reducing any concept of blame toward oneself or the other. At least, that’s how it’s functioned for me most beneficially, and I hope it can for others as well.
Check out “Find The Hidden” below:
